the gesture
by andsocanshe
Summary: It becomes their thing — another unspoken gesture that Harvey just does because, well, he doesn't do sentiment but Donna has always been the exception. It doesn't mean anything. — Valentine's Day One Shot, Pre/Post-Series.


_Happy Valentine's Day, Galentine's Day, February 14th (it's technically the 8th), or whatever. All that really matters is that it's the first Valentine's Day with canon (and married) Darvey._

_Thank you to Heather (kalingswifts) and Sam (swancharmings) for playing tag-team beta. I adore both of you._

—

_the gesture_

—

He's not… _unaware _of the date when he does it — "it" being leaving a cup of coffee on her desk first thing in the morning. It's the first time he's done that though, and it isn't her (their) usual with a splash of vanilla but the latte that she orders when she thinks that she deserves it. Harvey knows that she deserves it.

Even if it _is_ Valentine's Day.

The fact of the matter is that he's not that guy and he will never be that guy. Greeting card holidays don't hold precedence, a two month anniversary is just a day, and he's already sure that he will never attend a high school or college reunion. Besides, it's not like _that _between them. He and Donna… they've worked together for about a year, they flirt and he finds her attractive but he isn't stupid enough to think that _he _could be what she deserves — something that isn't _just _sex.

It doesn't mean anything.

It's just a day, really.

Yet his eyes find the gentle smile playing at her lips once she picks the cup up and reads the label. It's exactly what she orders and Harvey knows that Donna knows that he is the only person who would know that, down to the last detail.

—

It happens again the following Valentine's Day — their first together at Pearson Hardman.

Harvey gets in earlier than Donna, which is rare for him, and places the same coffee on her desk. He doesn't even question that her taste may have changed or that she might want something else because this is _her _indulgence. One of the little things that makes her a creature of habit.

He doesn't do flowers or chocolate or even acknowledge the day, but he acknowledges her. And if he's worried that this year is different, that the gesture might come with tension or awkwardness after _the other time_, he doesn't let it show.

Donna arrives at her desk not ten minutes later and spies the coffee sitting there. She knows what this is — even if she doesn't know _what _this _means _— and who it's from and she can't help that her gaze wanders into Harvey's office, settling on the slight upturn of his lips as he works on his laptop.

—

The coffee — _the gesture _becomes tradition almost too easily. Harvey leaves it the next year, the year after that, and the year after that until it becomes an unspoken _something _that he just does because, well, she's Donna.

Harvey doesn't really have an answer for why he does anything when it comes to Donna.

Still, Valentine's Day is just another day — another greeting card holiday, a two month anniversary holds no precedence, and frankly, he just doesn't _do _sentiment. Except that he brings Donna the latte that he knows she loves on the same day every year and they have a standing date at Del Posto on their work anniversary.

It doesn't mean anything.

—

He's running late.

The kid needed his help so he's running late and Harvey knows that this year — this year is the first that he's missed his chance so he's _this close _to strangling Mike with that stupid skinny tie of his even though he doesn't know why surprising her with coffee is so important anyway. But the second that he's finally on his way into work, Harvey stops by the coffee cart, buys Donna's coffee, and braces himself as he heads toward his office.

Why is he so nervous?

Donna's already at her desk, not that he's surprised, staring absentmindedly at her computer screen. Nothing gives away that she can sense him coming but Harvey knows that she does. Her eyes meet his as he moves toward her desk, stopping with an almost sheepish grin on his face and an outstretched hand.

Taking a breath, she takes the latte from him and looks at him quizzically. They've never discussed it before, she's never even thanked him for it before. It's just the thing that he does that they don't talk about because…

Because there are too many reasons not to about it.

And she almost doesn't speak as he begins to walk toward his office, but the words fall off of her tongue before Donna can stop them.

"Why?" she shakes her head, "Harvey, you hate Valentine's Day."

The look that he gives her is simple, like it's the most obvious thing in the world yet it's full of something that neither of them are capable of understanding. Something that neither of them are _willing _to understand.

"But I don't hate you."

The intention was probably a joke. Maybe. But Donna can't help that the bottom drops out of her world for just a split second. She knows that he doesn't _hate_ her, but that isn't _what _Harvey meant. He meant that she means more to him than his disdain for something that he finds pointless. Not just _more _to him; she means enough that he breaks his unwillingness to acknowledge a day that he never has for anyone else and _that _means something, doesn't it?

He smiles at her and Donna smiles back and Harvey goes into his office and the day continues as if it's any other day, except that she has a cup of coffee on her desk that she can't quite seem to finish.

—

_Because you can never go back._

It started before _the other time_, and continued long after — the small Valentine's Day gesture that solidified who they were from the start.

Friends. Coworkers. A team.

_I lied._

—

It's on her desk that morning just like it is every year, sitting between her computer and a multicolored BIC pen that is so _Donna_ that it's almost overwhelming to see. Back at _her _desk. In front of _his _office.

Harvey can't help the way his heart races, for once _not _on the verge of a panic attack when he places the coffee there before heading into his office.

They're readjusting; getting back into the swing of _them _now that she's working for him instead of Louis in the midst of Mike's trial and a part of Donna assumed that Harvey would have forgotten this year or that he had somehow outgrown it in the months that she had been gone, but it's there. In front of her — somehow both more and less glaring than she thought that it could be.

He told her that he loves her.

He ran.

She told him the same.

She left.

A part of her thought that she lost him in some way, that she would never be privy to the Harvey that made small gestures and cared without realizing that he _cared _again but there's the coffee that he knows that she treats herself with on her desk. The coffee that only he knows exactly how she orders.

On Valentine's Day.

If it means anything, they aren't in the place to acknowledge it. Yet.

—

It means something.

She's not on his desk anymore, but she isn't on Louis' either. Donna has a desk in an office of her own — an office that they kissed in — and Harvey is so damn proud of everything that she is. _He's in love with everything that she is_.

But like everything else, it's unspoken.

So he places the cup of coffee on her desk early that morning, well aware that it means something when he does it.

Well aware that it means something that the flowers on her desk unsettle him ever so slightly because she's in a relationship. On Valentine's Day. While he wants more but doesn't know how or if he's even allowed to tell her that. It hits him that this is the first time either of them have been with someone else on this day in all the years that they have known each other.

Harvey leaves her office and doesn't see the shuttered breath that Donna releases ten minutes later when she sees the coffee — the coffee from _him _— next to the flowers from someone that isn't. He can't feel the way her heart stops in her chest, or the way that she bites her bottom lip and forces herself not to turn around and leave. Instead, she takes the coffee but moves the flowers out of view and starts her day. Like it's any other day.

It means something.

She has all the faith in the world in him but the faith that he'll ever have the courage to realize let alone tell her what it means has begun to falter. It's been faltering for years, actually.

(In the end, he doesn't have to tell her. Donna reads it on his face and in his eyes not long after.)

—o—

It means _everything._

Maybe he is that guy, after all. Greeting card holidays still aren't that important, neither are two month anniversaries, and he never did attend any alumni reunions. But he does sentiment for her, and he has all along — from the coffee, to the can opener, to their work anniversary, to scotch in his office, and the fact that he never wanted to know what kind of lawyer (what kind of _man_) he would be without her.

She's different.

And it's only fitting, if not comical, that their first Valentine's Day as a couple, their first as a _married _couple even, is the first that he doesn't leave the same latte on her desk. He doesn't even bring her coffee to begin with.

Instead, Harvey wanders into their room as she's getting dressed with a cup of herbal tea from the coffee shop down the street and the chocolate that she's always craving. He kisses her lips before setting the items on the nightstand and watches as Donna smooths her dress down, one hand caressing the barely visible baby bump that's growing more and more prominent every day.

"What?" Donna asks, eyes leaving her bump and locking with his.

"Nothing," Harvey shrugs, "Just feels a little weird to break tradition."

Laughing, she rolls her eyes. Donna's sixteen weeks pregnant and although a cup of coffee won't hurt, the smell still makes her stomach turn even a month out of the first trimester. He's better off breaking tradition than spending another morning holding her hair while she throws up, she thinks.

"I don't know, breaking tradition," she steps closer, arms winding around his neck, her mouth just barely against his, "Sounds pretty good to me."

Harvey grins and closes the distance, fusing his lips to hers.

She's right, of course. Maybe there are exceptions to breaking tradition, the way she has always been the exception for everything else. He brought her coffee every year because he couldn't do _this_. He couldn't kiss her, he couldn't openly love her, and for a long time, it felt like the only thing that he could do was bring her something that reminded him of her on a day that he swore held no meaning.

And anyway, tradition can continue next year. They'll have a new baby and he's sure that Donna will need it. They both will.

—

_End._

—

_Thank you for reading!_

_Comments and criticism are always welcome._


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